by Lynn Watson
The café was quiet, as she expected on a Friday morning. She had a friendly word with the manager, Jean-Claude, chose her usual spot and settled down to search key words on the internet. She immediately struck lucky with ‘brain foods’, finding out from one source that attention had shifted from the benefits of the omega-3 foods, such as oily fish, walnuts and green vegetables, to another group of chemicals, the flavonoids, found in fruits such as blueberries and blackcurrants and also in cocoa, green tea and red wine. She copied down a few sentences, just to capture the main points for rereading and decoding later.
Flavonoids have been found to improve attention. They activate biochemical pathways that increase the expression of genes linked to memory. They can raise the level of proteins that are important for learning… They also increase the elasticity of blood vessels. This increases blood flow to the brain, which is good for mental performance.
Then a quote from a scientist:
‘Blueberries appear to have almost drug-like effects. It’s possible that these food-derived components may be used in the future as precursors for mind-enhancing drugs.’
Blueberries and cocoa – both brain foods. There it was, quick validation for the main selling point of Junoco, although the emphasis was on the potential to prevent or treat age-related conditions and the article made no reference to imagination or curiosity. There were words of caution too. Not all the scientists agreed on the potential benefits of flavonoids, but that was to be expected at the early experimental stage. Anyway, the unique make-up of Junoco, as Fran understood it, was taking brain enhancement to another level, where the wild imagination and the focused mind were boosted alongside each other.
There was plenty more stuff on how chocolate was good for the brain. One study indicated that high-flavonoid cocoa helps to rejuvenate specific brain activity through increased blood flow, while another reported that research participants given cocoa with high flavonoid levels scored better on cognitive tests than those who were given cocoa with moderate amounts. Also, to get enough flavonoids from chocolate, it had to be dark chocolate with an extremely high percentage of cocoa solids, higher than in most of the chocolate currently on sale and too bitter for accustomed tastes.
During her search, she also turned up lots of references to ‘smart drugs’ and ‘legal highs’. This information was so extensive and sprawling that she would have to investigate its relevance another time. In their discussions so far, she had registered Daniela’s insistence that Junoco was a legitimate enterprise with no connection to banned drugs.
After over an hour of this immersion, she was lured out of the café by the sunshine and decided to take a long walk along the river to Central London and back. She had promised herself this walk for weeks and now would be a good day to do it, when she had so much to ponder. And as she had just read, flowing water was good for thinking.
She stopped for lunch at a riverside pub and arrived home at four in the afternoon, feeling invigorated. As she was putting the kettle on, the doorbell rang. It was Lily from three doors away, without her scooter this time but with her hands clasped around a small furry creature. Fran sensed she had been waiting and watching for her to come home.
‘Hello, Fran. I’ve come to show you Sahara, my hamster. She’s six months old.’
She carefully adjusted her hands to reveal more of the twitching little nose and impressive whiskers.
‘Hello, Lily. Do you want to come in? She’s lovely, looks very inquisitive. Did you tell your mum and dad you were coming?’
‘Mum’s at work. She doesn’t get back till about five. I’ve told her about you, that we’re friends. Dad’s not living here now. He’s in Germany, and so is Ferdi.’
Fran beckoned her in and found an empty cardboard box for Sahara to nuzzle around in safely. She was about to open a packet of chocolate biscuits when Lily asked if she could have a cheese sandwich and a glass of milk – and a small piece of carrot or celery for Sahara.
It was still warm outside and Lily was wearing her baggy shorts again, with a stripy T-shirt and red trainers. Her hair was pulled back into an untidy long plait, her skin pale with light freckles.
‘I’m going to be a vet, I’ve decided.’
‘That would be excellent, very ambitious. A vet is a great thing to aim for.’
‘Are you going to be something… else?’
‘Me?’ Fran laughed, taken aback by the question. ‘Actually yes, I’ve got a new job selling chocolates and fancy clothes.’
‘That’s good, except I don’t like chocolate. And I always put on my old clothes when I get home. I’m glad you like Sahara. Do you want to be friends?’
‘Do I want to be friends with you or with Sahara? Yes, we can all be friends, but I’d have to meet your mum first.’
‘She won’t mind. She wants me to have more friends now that Ferdi isn’t here.’
‘Who’s Ferdi? Is he your brother?’
‘Yes, he’s nearly ten and I’m eleven and a half. Ferdi went to live with Dad and I stayed with Mum and we moved here. Mum says it’s a lot more peaceful now, but I’d like them to still be here, Dad and specially Ferdi. We had the same bedroom in our last house and we talked about animals and planets and robots and stuff like that before we went to sleep.’
‘Oh, Lily, that’s sad for you. I hope you can see him often? I had a little sister and I miss her.’
This was true, although she had hardly ever expressed it; she missed Marina, even now, after all this time. The sadness in Lily’s family would cast a shadow long into the future, far longer than her parents imagined in their attempts to set up a workable arrangement for the kids. Fran had moved to the window and was staring at the patch of sky over the roofs, the pristine white clouds. In her mind’s eye, she was reliving that first memory once again – the flying man in a helmet, the spinning wheels of the motorbike, the screaming and the struggle not to be carried away by a stranger.
As she lowered her gaze, she saw Marcus, her next-door neighbour, swinging into his front path. She didn’t know what kind of work he did, but he usually arrived home early on a Friday. She turned round and watched Lily for a full two minutes as she played teasingly with Sahara on her knees.
‘It’s after five now, Lily. Do you want to check if your mum’s home? I need to get on with making my tea.’
At that moment, the doorbell rang. It was Lily’s mother, a tall, slim woman with her hair pinned back in a neat chignon. She smiled and introduced herself as Petra, then looked past Fran down the hallway.
‘Yes, Lily’s here with Sahara. I hope that’s okay? I think she’s taken a fancy to my cream cheese sandwiches!’
She was aware of Petra’s unconscious appraisal, the rapid lowering and raising of the eyes to complete the body scan.
‘That’s good with me, it’s not a problem. I hope she is not disturbing you. She has a vivid imagination and she is in her own world, on her own little planet.’
Fran called Lily, who appeared with Sahara cushioned between her hands and held close to her chest. As the visitors left, Fran glanced across the street and saw a young woman with long hair and a big sports bag coming along the pavement. Absorbed by her mobile phone, she tripped on the exposed roots of the chestnut tree opposite and almost fell.
***
After dinner, Fran signed in to her favourite online dating site to check for any messages or prospects. Her preferred time for this was later at night, between twelve and one, when the mood was more relaxed and the conversation often amusing. Many of the guys on the site, or those she exchanged messages with, were not serious. They enjoyed the virtual flirting and the sense of possibility, sometimes going as far as a phone call or even venturing out on a real date, but then finding a reason, genuine or confected, why it wouldn’t work. On the rare occasions when she decided she wanted to see someone more than twice, they almost invariably went silent, had a dramatic family disaster or discovered they were still in love with their ex. This kind of nonsense was onl
y acceptable because she behaved in much the same way with some of the men who showed an interest in her.
She clicked on Ned’s profile. Yes, it was still there, and he had put up a new photo of himself in a dinner jacket and bow tie, which made him look even more handsome and debonair. He had to be attracting loads of attention. Did she care? Yes, in the moment she felt uneasy and discomforted, but it was the deal, what worked for them both right now. They were in a bubble of their own creation, and bubbles were by definition fragile and fleeting.
She continued web-surfing for a while, then turned off the computer and curled up on the sofa with a pile of magazines. She was just dozing off when someone slammed a door and she heard raised voices. She uncurled her legs and sat forward, straining to hear the words and trying to detect where the noise came from. It was next door, Marcus’ house, although whoever was shouting was on the street.
Fran dimmed the lamp and tiptoed to the bay window. Crouching low, she used her thumb and fingers to open a crack in the venetian blind on the small side window. The person was very close, but not in her line of sight. She closed the blind for a moment and stepped back, but then gingerly opened the slats again, slightly wider this time. It was midsummer and the sky wasn’t completely dark, plus the street light was nearby so she could make out the figure in some detail. It was the young woman she had noticed across the road by the tree; medium height, with braided black hair reaching halfway down her back. She was wearing tight jeans with a short pink or white jacket and her sports bag was on the ground beside her.
‘Please, Marcus! Let me in! I just want to talk to you.’
There was a muffled reply from the house and Fran shifted her angle of vision slightly, still keeping the opening in the blind narrow so she wouldn’t be seen. Marcus was in his front room and talking through the slightly open top half of the window. He had a deep and naturally soft voice and was attempting to calm things down, but to no effect.
‘It’s late. There’s nothing to talk about. There’s no point, Kirsty. Please go.’
He shut the window with a firm click and closed the curtains.
‘Fuck you, Marcus! You’re a useless shit. I’m back now and I’ve come halfway around the world to see you again. I’ve just got off the plane today, for fuck’s sake.’
She sat down on his low front wall and put her head in her hands. At this point, Fran heard another front door opening and a new voice, angry and indignant. It was the neighbour on the other side of Marcus, the sour-faced woman with the grumpy husband. Fran had had the misfortune to encounter them on the day she moved in, when they emerged from their house and, instead of welcoming her to the street, complained about her removal lorry being parked partly in front of their property. Although she couldn’t see them from her position at the window, she could imagine the grim couple standing side by side in their doorway.
‘What’s going on, young lady? What makes you think you can come here and disturb the peace? This is a respectable neighbourhood, or used to be.’
The young woman stood up and turned defiantly towards the speaker, happy to continue the tirade with a new antagonist.
‘Fuck off, you moany old slapper. And you too, you grizzled old fart. Mind your own fucking business.’
There was a moment’s silence. Fran pictured Marcus cowering under his windowsill. She suppressed a giggle, although no one was close enough to hear.
The husband took over now, all self-righteous. ‘Right, little madam, that’s quite enough of your lip. I’m giving you ten seconds to clear off and I don’t want to see you here again, understood? Ten seconds and I’m calling the police. I’ll have you arrested for breach of the peace. Now off you go, skedaddle!’
The young woman flicked her head contemptuously and hesitated for several seconds before deciding to take off at speed. Fran altered the angle of the blind again to get a better view and saw her turn and continue to run backwards for several steps, hurling a final and inaudible insult before she swung round with her bouncing bag and disappeared into the night.
Fran heard the neighbour couple closing their front door and then, a minute or two later, Marcus emerged and crept towards the pavement, peering down the street to make sure the young woman, Kirsty, really had left. Emboldened by the theatrical nature of the scene she had witnessed, Fran went quickly to her own door and out onto the path.
‘Marcus, are you okay? I couldn’t help overhearing…’
‘No, I’m sure the whole street must have heard it. I’m sorry to disturb you so late. It was my ex-girlfriend, as you probably gathered. She must have waited for me outside the office and followed me home. She was working abroad for two years and I never told her this address.’
‘Well, she gave the neighbours something to think about, anyway! Those two have been off with me ever since I moved in – most unfriendly.’
This was delivered in a kind of stage whisper, as she had mixed feelings about whether or not she wanted the couple to overhear. Marcus returned to his door and replied in a similar tone.
‘Yes, that’s Eric and Delia for you. Friendly isn’t their style. They’ll issue me with a stern warning tomorrow, you can bet your bottom dollar. I swear they sit in silence looking at each other across the room and waiting for a pin to drop, so they can complain about it. They knock on the wall every time they hear me so much as pick up my saxophone – not that I’m much good at it, I have to admit. Look, Fran, rather than stand out here with them trying to spy on us, why don’t you come in for a quick drink or a coffee?’
‘Oh, thank you but I have to… no, okay then I will, just for half an hour.’
Although they hadn’t spoken since the incident with Lily and the falling bird a few weeks earlier, she had found him pleasantly unassuming, very likeable, and despite the late hour, she felt comfortable accepting the invitation.
Entering the house, she was surprised to see that the original Victorian layout had all but disappeared and the ground floor was now open-plan. There was a wrought-iron spiral staircase in the centre and a spacious kitchen and dining area extending out into the garden. The main pieces of furniture were modern and there were several large paintings on the walls, as well as a beautiful lamp and wall lights in stained glass.
‘Wow, what a lovely place.’
‘Thank you, yes. I didn’t do any of the structural changes. That was all done when I bought it and that’s why I decided to go for it – plenty of light and space.’
She looked around and pointed towards one of the pictures, a tropical beach scene with fishing boats moored up to a jetty and two young children sitting on the wooden structure, dangling their legs over the edge.
‘What about the paintings and the stained-glass pieces? Are they originals?’
‘Yes, they’re all mine, actually. I’m still doing the day job but I rent a studio not far away and I sometimes work in my summer house at the end of the garden. It needs a proper tidy out, which is why I haven’t been using it yet this summer. And it’s another bone of contention with Eric and Delia, the noise when I get going on cutting glass. I’m glad you’ve moved in on the other side, anyway.’
They chatted over a glass of wine and Fran discovered that in the day job Marcus was a civil servant at the Department of Health. She told him about her sales position in the shop, leaving out the Junoco marketing offer and her meteoric promotion, if that was what it was. They kept off the topic of the ex-girlfriend too; another one for another day, if she got to know him better.
Chapter 4
There was an empty space on the high black shelf, where a hat was missing; the brown fedora, naturally. Maybe Ned was a secret agent, after all. Fran smiled and reached her hands towards the ceiling, her nails shimmering pink this time in the scattered light of the glass lamp with its twisted blue and orange snakes.
‘Are you awake, Ned?’ she whispered.
He made a husky sound, very dreamy, and lifted his head under the duvet, facing away from her. ‘No… yes, sort of – I
’m coming to.’
She stroked his shoulder and lightly fingered the back of his neck.
‘It’s after nine – dinner time.’
He turned round with fake grumpiness and they wound their bodies together for another couple of minutes until he started tickling the soles of her feet with his toes. Her legs retracted in a reflex action, making her knees press against his stomach.
‘Stop it, Ned, that’s not allowed; too ticklish. It’s time to pass me my robe. And after dinner, I’ve got a special treat for you.’
‘What is it? Not too energetic, I hope?’
‘No – at least, I don’t think so. I’ll tell you later.’
She went quiet for a few moments and then spoke again. ‘Ned?’
He murmured to let her know he was still awake.
‘How long will this last, do you think?’
He turned over and lightly kissed her forehead. ‘Who knows – maybe until someone decides to jump on our sandcastle?’
Dinner was a green Thai curry and coconut rice, flavoured with lemongrass and cardamom. As usual, the ingredients were lined up on the counter and she watched from her perch on the high bar stool as Ned shredded, blended, stirred, seasoned, simmered and fluffed them up to transform them into a new creation, garnished with coriander. Fran breathed in to capture the exotic smells as he carried the serving dishes past her and into the sitting room.
‘I love coconut – delicious. Did your clever fridge decide we’d have this for dinner?’
‘Yes, as always.’
‘But how does it know what else…?’
‘It doesn’t. It only knows what’s in the fridge – it’s not psychic, yet. If I serve up a beautiful Bolognese without any spaghetti one night, you’ll know why.’